who makes Jessops film?

Thomas Bertilsson said:

Thanks Mark for providing the explanation. So, it is the type font on the edge marking that gives away the factory origin? To me they were just two completely different names, and each frame had a number, so it looked dissimilar to me.
- Thomas

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Yes, that and at the time Agfa had just invested in a machine that could put any companies name along the edges.

before they switched to Agfa they kept the KB edge markings from EFKE

The point 'why worry' is that if you have a Jessop pan film and use say Xtol? the box won't give you development info.
Knowing that it is APX allows you to give it the correct development, that may be important if you use a non listed developer on a shop branded film.
Knowing that Jessops is Agfa also allowed me to get hold of cheaper APX and Jessops are the largest retailer in the UK so that's a lot of good cheap APX..

JPD said:

Even if they knew, they wouldn't tell you. The owner of the brand name is usually not allowed to tell anyone who the maker is.

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Freestyle makes no attempt to hide their Arista sources....not that it isn't all over the internet anyway....

Don't forget, Ilford has stopped all private label sales. They were the original Arista films.

Interesting about the font type on the edge markings - learn something knew every day

It's been pointed out here and elsewhere that often the country of origin label provides a clue to the manufacturer as well, and that is required by many (most?) countries regardless of re-branding. So, as has been pointed out, Freestyle's Arista.EDU Ultra clearly says "Made in Czech Republic" (which makes it Foma), Arista II said "Made in Germany" (Agfa at the time), Arista Ultra.EDU said "Made in Hungary" (Forte at the time), etc.

Although I've noticed the Ferrania rebranded colour films now tend to say "Made in the E.U." instead of "Made in Italy", which makes things a bit harder, although there are still a limited number of film producers in the E.U., so it's not too hard to figure out. And, with the demise of Konica's film production, as far as I'm aware current films indicating "Made in Japan" are all Fuji.

A point raised earlier, about asking Jessops about who supplies them

I work for a branded company that gets some of its stuff made elsewhere. I've also worked for companies selling stuff to retailers under private label.

The retailer isn't under any obligation to keep quiet about who supplies them, and quite often the people making the own label stuff will readily admit they supply say Tesco. It acts as halo branding to get more business.
Retailers don't often name the subbies, as on the shop floor they don't know, and higher up, they like to keep the information under wraps for commercial reasons.

Although I've noticed the Ferrania rebranded colour films now tend to say "Made in the E.U." instead of "Made in Italy", which makes things a bit harder, although there are still a limited number of film producers in the E.U., so it's not too hard to figure out. And, with the demise of Konica's film production, as far as I'm aware current films indicating "Made in Japan" are all Fuji.[/QUOTE]

These is a fair amount of Konica still in the pipe line that still shows up in the Dollar Stores, as well has some Agfa. I think that there are only 4 compaines left that coat color film, Ferrania, Kodak, Fuji, and Lucky from China. At my local dollar store I found short dated 36 ISO 200 Samsung, marked make in PRC, packaged in Mexico. I guess it is Lucky which makes it 1990s Kodak. I dont know if Slavich coats color not, we get B@W paper but have not seen any Slavich film.

Aurum said:

I work for a branded company that gets some of its stuff made elsewhere.

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Is that company "Land Roewi" who get things made in Kwina ?

Ian

No thats turn right out of the front door and keep going down lode lane until you see a range rover on a pile of rocks.

And its Tata, who will probably be outsourcing to India

So we say Tata to you then, once in India there's a high demand for poor english speakers, or should that be people who speak English poorly in UK Call Centres.

As your Brummie accent will be a very major hindrance it may be many years before they will let you cancel all Dave Millers Credit, call in all his loans and demand LF cameras in back tax. But be wise in 2018 you will succeed the metal eating america genetical hybrid aluminium worms with be eating his Cambo!!!!

Paul Howell said:

I dont know if Slavich coats color not, we get B@W paper but have not seen any Slavich film.

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Slavich has a Web site. It's Russian only (the "eng." link seems to pull up a single page with company history but nothing more). Babel Fish seems to do a tolerable job translating it. I don't see any mention on their site of current color materials, just B&W paper and the fact that they used to make color paper. I expect it'd be hard for them to make product that use current color processes (C-41, E-6, or RA-4), since to the best of my knowledge they never made such products, just materials with the Soviet processes, which were closely related to old Agfa processes. At least their B&W papers can be processed in whatever developers we use in the US, Western Europe, or elsewhere.

Paul Howell said:

These is a fair amount of Konica still in the pipe line that still shows up in the Dollar Stores, as well has some Agfa. I think that there are only 4 compaines left that coat color film, Ferrania, Kodak, Fuji, and Lucky from China. At my local dollar store I found short dated 36 ISO 200 Samsung, marked make in PRC, packaged in Mexico. I guess it is Lucky which makes it 1990s Kodak. I dont know if Slavich coats color not, we get B@W paper but have not seen any Slavich film.

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Ah, well, none of the dollar stores around me sell film that I can find - a couple of "$10 or under" stores sell the disposable cameras, but that's about it. Drug store/supermarket chain private brands appear to be mostly Fuji and sometimes Ferrania around here.

Not sure what the deal is with Lucky - I picked up some of their SHD400CN (C-41 process B&W film) from an eBay seller in Taiwan last year, which wasn't great, but it was cheap, and when I enquired about getting more he said he was told by his sources at the factory that they were stopping all film production until their current stocks have cleared out. However, checking eBay, I haven't seen any more of their (regular) SHD400 for a while, only SHD100 - so, not sure if they've just discontinued the SHD400, or if the SHD100 is still old stock, or what's going on exactly...

I'm fairly certain Slavich doesn't do film, only paper. There is still an FSU film plant in Kazakhstan called TASMA - but they don't appear to sell outside of the FSU, and finding an English-speaking source in the FSU who can still get it is difficult (I tried contacting one in Moscow, but got no response a while back). I'd be curious to try it if I could get some - it would be interesting to try it in my FSU cameras

srs5694 said:

Slavich has a Web site. It's Russian only (the "eng." link seems to pull up a single page with company history but nothing more). Babel Fish seems to do a tolerable job translating it. I don't see any mention on their site of current color materials, just B&W paper and the fact that they used to make color paper. I expect it'd be hard for them to make product that use current color processes (C-41, E-6, or RA-4), since to the best of my knowledge they never made such products, just materials with the Soviet processes, which were closely related to old Agfa processes. At least their B&W papers can be processed in whatever developers we use in the US, Western Europe, or elsewhere.

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I found an old webb site that list B@W plates but not film.

Paul Howell said:

I found an old web site that list B@W plates but not film.

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Thats an old 1917 website from when the internet was mechanical and ran from an overhead pulley system.


Steve.

and steam!

Steve Smith said:

Thats an old 1917 website from when the internet was mechanical and ran from an overhead pulley system.


Steve.

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Getting back to the original question, Jessop's black & white film has been made by at least three different manufacturers which is why it gets so confusing. Originally it was all rebranded Efke - they did all 3 speeds in both 120 rollfilm & 35mm, and later the "100" speed Efke film in 127 though I'm not sure whether than ever got put in a Jessops marked box. But as someone has pointed out Jessops always doubled the speeds so 25 was 50, 50 was 100 and 100 was 200. This reflects the belief that Efke never revised their speeds for B & W films unlike Ilford, Kodak et al. Because yonks ago, possibly the 50's or 60's, speeds were doubled to get rid of the built-in safety factor. So, for example, the Ilford FP2 or 3 of the time went from ASA64 to 125.

Then at some point in the 1990's, Jessops switched supplier for the 35mm films only. Possibly this was to offer a 400 speed film which I believe Efke didn't manufacture. These new 35mm films were in 100 & 400 only and were marked as made in Spain (I've still got 2 rolls expiry 2000). So I think that must have been either Negra or Valco. The Efke manufactured rollfilms continued in the Jessop line. But at some point the Spanish factory presumably closed down. Jessops then slightly changed the name of the films and these were different products and in fact were clearly Agfa made, in fact rebadged APX 100 & 400. Later the film names were changed again so possibly that was when Agfaphoto ceased manufacture but as I never bought any I'm not sure who made this product. Meanwhile the Jessops rollfilm line was "rationalised" and only "200" speed Efke sourced rollfilm was available in both 120 & 127.

As for the Jessops colour films, the colour print ones I've used were Agfa products but its likely they've changed over the years. Their online store still lists a lot of film but the only Jessop labelled film appears to be an APS film.

Thanks Brac. So it seems like the films I got were APX 100. Pity they weren't the old Agfapan 100; my favourite film 'til Agfa "improved" it...
Alan Clark

Dave Miller said:

I don't suppose the shop staff know.

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You must be joking ,I was in my local Jessops store a couple of weeks ago and asked for a couple of rolls of 35 m/m Fuji Reala, the assistant had to consult the computer, I'm not sure if it was to see what Reala is, or what film is ! then told me he could get me some from their warehouse Leicester in ten days, I walked round the corner to a small independent camera dealer, and bought the film.